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On Thursday, Mark Zuckerberg unveiled "Facebook Home," a "launcher" for the social network's mobile apps on Android devices. The software will come pre-installed on HTC's $99 First phone, but that was presented as almost an afterthought.

This "new home on Android," is not about what hardware it runs on—it would run on iOS devices if Apple allowed it—but about the fullest expression to date of Zuckerberg's vision of the total Facebook experience. Many have pointed out that Facebook Messenger is front and center in Home, but the more significant design feature is what he calls "people first." Unlike the conventional smartphone experience that is about interacting with your phone through apps, Zuckerberg wants to "flip that around," so that you are interacting with your phone through "people first, and then you could interact with apps when you want to."

As compelling as the idea of a people-centric phone is, we have to remember that in proposing this, Facebook is putting itself forward as the universal proxy for "people." In many ways it is already the social passport for the internet, but "home" take this default to a higher level.

First, on a design level, it looks like a really fine piece of work. Everything about Home makes interacting with the world through Facebook faster and easier. With Home installed, not only is Facebook your default screen, but Messenger is always on, no matter what other app you are using. Little, round "chat heads" pop in from the side of the screen whenever you have a message from a Facebook Friend.

Not only is Facebook the virtual operating system for the devices it is installed on, but Facebook itself is the major curation method for determining what content, and whose chat heads, show up on your screen. All of this is very clever and will clearly boost engagement for the users that install it. So the question is, will people install it?

To answer that question, we have to consider how Home articulates what Facebook is in contrast to the competing grand visions of Google and Apple. If Facebook is all about people, then Google is about information and Apple about media. Each of these is a way into the wider internet and each have their advantages. Facebook is positioning itself lowest in the "stack" by playing to our emotional need for connection with others. Apple comes next by stroking our need to be stimulated and entertained. Google has the most cerebral hook, it fulfills our need to be informed and intelligent.

When I look at it this way, I would bet on Facebook for world domination. It will never be a content experience of as high a quality level as Apple or be as all-around useful as Google, but it gets at where we live and plays on our emotional vulnerabilities. But it is in this murky world of vulnerabilities that Facebook's own weaknesses potentially undermine its position. We may trust an intermediary to broker our entertainment or informational utility, but do we trust Facebook to so directly mediate our emotional lives?

The level of access that Home allows Facebook to the stuff of users' lives is unprecedented. It does abide by its (already aggressive) privacy policies, but the amount and consistency of interactions will be of another order of magnitude. Think about how much more interaction data we create tapping and swiping around our phones compared to clicking on our desktop computers. Facebook Home is not merely an app, but a method of capturing behavior data on a very granular level.

This is not surprising or revolutionary, merely the logical outcome of Zuckerberg's vision of a more "connected" society. Home raises the question of how people actually feel about the central position that Facebook already occupies in their digital lives. Will we, in fact, allow it to be the default? As I suggested in a recent post, it would be in Facebook's interest to subsidize "Facebook phones" for teenagers so that its software became the default for that generation. And the same can be said in the developing world, that "next billion people," that Zuckerberg referred to on Thursday who will not only be "mobile first," but "mobile only."

The idea for the art on this story came from a story yesterday by Heather Kelly on CNN about the privacy implications of Home, where she writes, "On a regular phone, Facebook's data collecting powers are limited to what you do inside the official Facebook mobile app or on the site in a browser. Facebook Home frees Facebook from that prison and gives it wider rein to collect more information about a person's location, actions and communications."

If Home frees Facebook from a prison, it puts users, in effect, under willing house arrest. Just as we give ourselves over to Apple for making our digital media "just work" together (when it does, that is) or to Google for getting us to where we want to go and telling us what we're looking for, our embrace of Facebook is based on the ease with which we can connect with and keep up with people. In an accelerated society, speed counts and for most people privacy concerns are much lower on the priority list than avoiding the frustration of spinning wheels and switching between apps and devices to get things done.

So is Facebook Home a prison from which we have no interest in escaping? By creating a mobile experience on Android that aligns with how people are actually using Facebook in their lives, the company is hoping that users will jump in and admit their own immersion. And if users are hesitant, Facebook has many levers it can pull to make the Home package more attractive. It all boils down to the central question of digital identity, does a person allow themselves to be known in return for being delivered a more relevant and enjoyable experience? This is complicated by the social multiplier, because what we are allowing to be known is not just ourselves, but our intersections with the identities of our friends as well.

Uncomfortably, in return for a "people first" experience, we have to ignore our social obligations to the propriety of our friends' identities. The inability to do this is what led writer Douglas Rushkoff to loudly quit the service. I'm not sure that such concerns will influence many people. Facebook's example of a launcher for a set of apps is a tonic alternative to the existing default apps that Android phones come with. Apple would do well to allow users to put such custom collections together for themselves, but it is unlikely to do so. That so much of what users do on their iPhones is owned by Facebook must surely gall Apple, just as the popularity of Google's iOS apps has.

Facebook is trying something new here with Home. It is a walled garden alternative to other walled gardens. In the not-too-distant future, improvements in web apps will make these kind of "launchers" commonplace, and Facebook is wise to try to consolidate its position before that happens. The only threat larger than these big players to each other is that of the open web itself. Facebook is making a home it hopes will be comfortable enough with our existing habits that we resist the temptation to remove our ankle bracelets.